Monday, September 15, 2008

Kladdkaka or a Swedish lingonberry and chocolate brownie

Photo updated in October 2013. The photo above is by Juta Kübarsepp for Nami-Nami/Kodu ja Aed.

I went on a Stockholm day cruise last week with my friend Melissa and her daughter Natali. Melissa is a friend from my Edinburgh-days, who is now based in Toronto. She spent 9 days in Tallinn, and to give her a small break from my hometown, we popped over to the capital of Sweden for a day. It was lovely, if a bit chilly and wet, and luckily the ferry ride wasn't too bumpy.

On a way back to the ferry terminal I picked up two Swedish food magazines, and this Chocolate and Lingonberry Cake in the August issue of Allt of Mat immediately caught my eye. K's mum provides us with lots of lingonberries these days, you see, and although I liked the last week cardamom-scented Swedish lingonberry cake, it's fun to try new recipes. This one was a great hit with K (he had 3 slices on Saturday night alone), and his mum called me yesterday afternoon to tell how much she and her friends liked the cake, too. It's almost brownie-like in texture - smooth and velvety - with lingonberries giving a nice acidic kick to it. Well worth a try!

Melt the butter on a low heat, then cool a little.
Whisk eggs and sugar until pale and foamy.
Sift flour, cocoa powder and salt into a bowl, then fold into the egg mixture together with the melted butter.
Spoon the batter (it's pretty mousse-like) into a buttered 24 cm spring form, smooth the top. Sprinkle the lingonberries evenly over the cake.
Bake at the lower half of a 175 C/340 F oven for 25-30 minutes, until you can see the sides of the cake loosening from the tin.
Let the cake cool in the tin for a short while before transferring it onto a cake plate.
Serve with ice cream or whipped cream.

11 comments:

Me too! I did chocolate-sour cherry brownies last week (gorgeous) and wonder if I could use cherries with this. Or rhubarb. It's the only way I can think to get the 'sourness' and 'juiciness' of lingonberries???

Looks great. I'm living in Newfoundland and we call lingonberries partridgeberries over here. I think here and around Estonia/Sweden are the only few places in the world where you can actually get them.

I feel exactly the same way! If only I could find lingonberries! My only outlet for buying Swedish stuff is the local Ikea and they are no help in this department. They do however have this great Sparkling cider called Kristian Regale which is delicious in its own right...